After years of dispute, software giant Adobe has finally said it will cease support for Flash for mobile devices, in a victory for Apple, which has long opposed the use of the plug-in software.
The use of Flash in mobile devices has been at the core of a key debate among smartphone users. Apple has never supported Flash on its devices, instead opting to use HTLM5 – Adobe says it will now support this format as well.
Apple has argued for years Flash is clunky and affects smooth performance, but some users have avoided buying iPhones because of its lack of support for the software.
“HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively,” Adobe vice president Danny Winokur said in a statement.
“This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms. We are excited about this, and will continue our work with key players in the HTML community, including Google, Apple, Microsoft and RIM, to drive HTML5 innovation they can use to advance their mobile browsers.”
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
